There is also the option to use an iPad as a drawing tablet now. We've been doing this for a few years with Astropad. https://www.astropad.com
Astropad connects your iPad to your Mac and so it acts like a Cintiq. We have Windows support in private beta right now and we'll be launching it publicly next year.
This is compelling for a lot of people because:
1. The Apple Pencil is fantastic
2. You get a general purpose iPad as well!
And it is about the same price as a pen tablet with way more flexibility.
The vast majority of it has been software work, but we have developed a new model of Luna Display that supports HDMI specifically for the Windows market.
The USB-C dongle we didn't have to change and that will work as is on Windows.
Hi HN! I'm excited to share Luna Display for Windows, a new hardware dongle that turns the iPad into a wired or wireless display for the PC! We are long-time Mac developers who transitioned to Windows over the past 1.5 after being sherlocked by Apple (long story..)
So why hardware? There are no official APIs available on Mac or Windows for creating a virtual display. We have competitors that use low-level drivers to create a virtual display, but that is prone to subtle bugs. For example, virtual displays on Windows require reimplementing the GPU stack, which is extremely complex. We went with hardware because it's the only way to provide absolute reliability and compatibility across all PC programs. Luna Display is indistinguishable from a regular monitor to Windows.
Luna Display started as Mac/iOS apps written almost entirely in Objective-C. To go cross-platform, we selected Rust as our language of choice, and we've been incredibly happy with it. Our apps are now mostly Rust, with glue layers in C# on Windows, and Objective-C on iPadOS for the UI code.
Another interesting thing about our tech stack is that it contains a custom video compression algorithm and network protocol that we built for very low latency. The network protocol is built in Rust and sits on top of UDP and has a custom congestion control system. Our video compressor is C/C++ and a mix of assembly for max performance.
If you're interested, we'd love to have you back us on Kickstarter! I'm also happy to answer any questions about hardware, Windows, Rust, getting sherlocked, you name it. :)
PS: Luna Display also works with Mac if that's your jam!
Cool product! I am a Linux user, so that is not quite for me. But almost!
I was just bummed that target display mode was removed in 2012. The last Mac I owned voluntarily had it, and the one I have now just sort of ended up in my hands. Now it is just an amazing display I don't really want to use since I can't run a proper OS on it without ruining the Mac os experience for my wife.
Thanks! IMAP account support is something I would really like to add (and Mimestream already uses IMAP for some specific operations where it is a better fit), but from past experience I know that it is complicated ;)
I'm also really keen on adding support for JMAP and Office 365 I the future.
Excited that you're considering JMAP! Hopefully it solves some of the pain-points of implementing IMAP and makes it easier to deliver a great UX. If e.g. Mimestream can deliver as good a UX with a Fastmail account (or Cyrus IMAP or Dovecot installation) as it does with a Gmail account, I think it will help the independent email ecosystem. (Though there is a big headwind, so I understand focusing on Gmail now.)
Edit: downloaded the beta. Will give it a shot with my work G Suite account.
I am really excited about adding support for JMAP – I participated in the IETF WG for it, gave some feedback, and think it's a very well-designed protocol that should be really efficient at syncing email. It would probably be one of the most fun features for me to add to the app, but yeah, there's still a lot of work left for the Gmail account experience first.
Adding JMAP would be a definite +1 for me. I use fastmail and their web interface is good and mobile app is better.
I use Thunderbird on my Mac because I need things like smart signatures that are dependent on my outgoing email address but I want a combined Inbox.
A native app that supports JMAP and provides that sort of integration would let me migrate from Thunderbird, which while it's been awesome for the years I've used it, is showing its UI age.
Is there a list of shortcuts somewhere? All I see is the choice for Default, Apple Mail, or Gmail. And only about half of the Gmail shortcuts I tried seem to work.
Support for both Gmail and Office 365 with their own proprietary APIs would be a knockout feature. Also I really appreciate the fact you don't use any intermediary servers, which has held me back from using some other macOS email clients.
Upgrades are still a good option but I didn't discuss them in the article because they aren't supported on the App Store.
One caveat with upgrades is it's difficult to maintain many version of the same app. Now with frequent hardware and OS upgrades (yearly!) it's even more expensive than ever to maintain many versions.
We've never taken features away and put them behind a subscription paywall, and we never intend to! So don't worry about that!
Also hardware allows us to have the upgrade pricing model you described. If we make a hardware device that's even better than the Luna you have now, you can choose to upgrade! Escaping the App Store model has been a really refreshing part of making hardware.
- In Thin Air - About a mountaineering expedition that turned into disaster on Mount Everest.
- Black Hawk Down - The story of hundreds of US special forces trapped in Mogadishu overnight after a mission went completely sideways
- Leadership in Turbulent Times - About different US presidents leading through crisis and how there is no one singular type of leadership
- The Hard Thing about Hard Things - Leading a startup on the verge of failure to an eventual massive acquisition
- The Sledge Patrol - How a small group, outgunned and out manned fought back Nazi invaders in Greenland